Koolau
Give me a museum and I'll fill it. (Picasso) Give me a forum ...
It might be relevant to your decision in this way... If you believe taxes in the future must be higher, you might be tempted to give more preference to Roth; but then if government decides to increases taxes not so much via income tax but instead via VAT, it might turn out that Traditional IRA was better after all (since your income tax would still be lower but VAT would be the tax making up the difference). So, recognizing this possibility may pull you back to Traditional IRA.
You are suggesting that it's not a "wash" between Trad. and Roth if VAT is thrown into the mix. T-Al suggested it's a "wash". I still don't know how to do the math. Anyone?